


Canyons of Consciousness

by Samuraiter



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Super Dangan Ronpa 2
Genre: F/M, Fix-It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-06
Updated: 2015-07-06
Packaged: 2018-04-08 01:17:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4285203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Samuraiter/pseuds/Samuraiter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Could there be a back-up hiding deep inside the system?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Canyons of Consciousness

**Author's Note:**

  * For [NightsMistress](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NightsMistress/gifts).



> The title and setting are inspired by the conclusion of the Moowis sequence in _Soul Hackers_ (and by listening to countless remixes of "The Son of Flynn" from the _Tron: Legacy_ OST). To me, it makes sense that a similar idea might exist in this game. Be forewarned that there are references here to the possible disfigurements that the characters might have suffered from their lives prior to the events of the game, as well as spoilers for the game itself.

After forty-one attempts, the corridor had stabilized. To the eyes of Hajime, it seemed like nothing more than a passage of gray stone, but he had come to appreciate the lines upon lines of code that had been used to bore a hole into the underpinnings of the Program, to permit him to reconstruct his avatar and go there in the hopes of conducting his search. If he had gone through the corridor in one of its prior states, his mind could have been permanently lost ... or scrambled to the point of death. To tell the truth, looking at the black doorway in front of him still left him in a cold sweat.

Next to him, Sonia – looking as she had in the Program, he noticed, not as she did in reality – said, taking a deep breath, "No time like the present, is there?" She had a point, but it still took him a second to process her appearance. In the real world, she no longer had her original face, only the face that had belonged to Junko, stapled to her head, unable to emote. To see her able to smile again made his heart skip a beat, but ... he had not come back to the Program to stare at her. They had business, and, if he had been reading the notes left by the Future Foundation correctly, limited time.

"You're right," he said, taking her by the hand, "let's go." He wished that the others – Fuyuhiko, Akane, and Kazuichi – could be there to accompany them, but he needed them to monitor their progress from outside. They had to base most of their guesses about the Program upon incomplete data, and that meant that both their bodies and their minds might constantly be at risk. As long as the others provided all the safety that they could, they had less to worry them, but ... not enough time, never enough time. And so he and Sonia marched through the black rectangle together, and into —

Sunlight? But the sky had no Sun in it, only endless blue in all directions, both above and below their feet, though they had cliffs to either side of them, as if they had arrived in mid-air inside a canyon of unimaginable size. Hajime attempted to walk forward, and the cliffs moved as if he did so, but he did not think, for one second, of letting Sonia go. As impossibly beautiful – and _real_ – as it all seemed, he had no idea where danger could be lurking, so he had to hang on to her. Their footsteps made no noise, but they continued to advance, though the horizon before them did not seem to change.

After a long silence, Sonia said, "You're looking for Chiaki here, aren't you?" And he nodded. No sense denying it. Attempting to restore their friends to life had been their dream for months, but they had made no progress in achieving it, and he had placed his hope in finding ... anything. Chiaki had been a program herself, after all, and he had increasingly started to hang his hopes on the idea that there might be a back-up of her, a ghost hiding in the reams and reams of data required to make the Program function. All of those hard drives and servers had to have _something_ hidden in all the space.

"If she's here, if there's anything left of her, she might be able to help us," Hajime admitted, "but, more than anything, I –" Did the sky seem to brighten around them? "– yeah, I miss her. I still miss her." He could feel Sonia tighten her grip on his hand. Empathy – one key thing they had all relearned together. "I want her to help us, but, I ... want her back, too." He blinked, and they had ground beneath their feet – hard, rocky, and rough, but ground, nonetheless. "I think we might be on to something. Let's keep going." No running. They still had to take care. But progress was still progress.

Sonia said, "Look. Up ahead." And she pointed to ... ruins? They reminded Hajime of the gray version of Hope's Peak Academy that he had seen on Jabberwock Island, except ... degraded. Incomplete. Uncoded? Which word best represented what he was seeing? His eyes had trouble processing it as it was, but they continued towards it. The doors had been left open ... or never included in the first place. But Hajime had a feeling about the place, and he had to follow it. Unsurprisingly, as soon as they passed through the doorway, everything around them changed, becoming a —

Hard to say. Impossible to tell up from down, left from right. He could see pixels missing, the walls "clipping" and making his head hurt with how they seemed to be both _there_ and _not there_ at the same time. Letters and numbers danced through the gaps, catching his attention before disappearing again. What had the notes called instances like this? Data dumps? Fragments? No idea, and the dummied-out environment made it hard to concentrate, but Sonia still had his hand, and ... he had been through worse. What was a little disorientation? He shook his head, gathered his thoughts, and —

"Chiaki?" Sonia called her name first, her voice soft, as if talking to a person directly in front of her. "Are you ... here?" No echo, despite how vast the (non-)space around them seemed. But Hajime could feel a sense of warmth, of recognition, and, judging from how Sonia squeezed his hand, she could feel it, too. He thought that he could see a mote of light amidst all the random bits of data and detritus, but he could not be certain, no matter how hard he tried to focus on it. But there was that inescapable sense that a third person stood there with them, present, but, perhaps, unable to speak.

"Reach out to me," Hajime said, his voice breaking. "You can't stay here. It's not safe ... for any of us." He almost wished that Usami could be there to cut the tension, if only as ineffectively as she normally did. But he could swear that he heard a soft yes. Or was it a trick of his imagination? He held out his free hand, thought he could touch the warmth around them, just barely. And, as soon as he did, he called out, "Kazuichi! If you can hear me, save and extract!" If the portable hard drive were big enough. He closed his eyes, doing his best to hang on to both Sonia and the "Chiaki" that might have been.

The next thing he knew, he was sitting up in the coffin-like chamber used to house his body during virtual insertion, coughing and choking to get all of the oxygenated liquid out of his lungs as a pair of hands – Akane, he could tell from how strong they were – held him steady. He wanted to get all the questions out. _Did Sonia make it out, too? Did you get Chiaki? Is everyone all right?_ But he had to settle for gagging and coughing as Akane wiped the liquid from his face. Like it or not, he was still human, still Hajime Hinata, even if everything he attached to name resembled a crazy patchwork.

Off to one side, he heard Kazuichi say, over the sound of his motorized wheelchair, "I got her, man. I got 'em both. How do ya like that?" A dry chuckle, ending in a wheeze. "I had _just_ enough space, but it's Chiaki. She's in there. Somehow. I don't know how we'll talk to her, but ... we'll find a way." He turned his chair. "Got to make sure you and Sonia are okay first, right? I couldn't see a whole lot of what was happening, but there's no way that was easy on your brain." Hajime could hear other feet entering the room at a brisk clip. "Help us get 'em out, Fuyuhiko. If you don't mind, I mean."

Hajime could not help smiling as Akane helped him get to his feet. They did everything by the seat of their pants, did they not? After all, they _had_ to. But it was no longer from desperation, or from the orders of a person long dead. No, they did it from the hope that Makoto and the others had tried to teach them, and they still had a lot to learn, but ... hope had helped him bring Chiaki back. In hoping for a step, he managed to leap. If they could talk to her, if they could build that bridge to her, they might reach their friends, might bring _them_ back. They only had to keep at it and not lose hope.

Sonia had his hand again, and he squeezed hers in return. She also returned his smile, at least as best she could. They were going to have a busy morning ahead of them.

**END**.


End file.
